{"id":475077,"date":"2026-02-18T03:34:10","date_gmt":"2026-02-18T03:34:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/475077\/"},"modified":"2026-02-18T03:34:10","modified_gmt":"2026-02-18T03:34:10","slug":"angela-bassett-issues-charge-to-entertainment-industry-at-abff-honors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/475077\/","title":{"rendered":"Angela Bassett Issues Charge to Entertainment Industry at ABFF Honors"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tAngela Bassett<\/a> openly shared her thoughts on AI, the regression of D.E.I. efforts and the entertainment industry at large as she accepted the Excellence in the Arts award at the 9th Annual ABFF<\/a> Honors Monday night.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cSomeone said earlier, and it\u2019s true, we are living in a moment where the language of inclusion and belonging is being challenged, rebranded and in some cases, erased altogether,\u201d Bassett began in her acceptance speech. \u201cWords that once felt like promise and possibility are now treated as words to avoid. And this shift has landed in our very real lives, real careers and real dreams. At the same time, our industry is transforming at lightning speed. Technology is moving faster than wisdom. Business models are shifting under our feet. Stories are being shortened, flattened and sometimes stripped of their soul in the name of efficiency and projected progress. And in moments like this, I believe it\u2019s fair and necessary to ask, where do Black creatives fit into this future? Who gets to imagine it? Who gets to participate? Who gets to decide?<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI came into this business at a time when there were very few examples that told me that a Black woman could live a full, complex, enduring life on screen, and even fewer that suggested that she could ship what happens behind the camera,\u201d the 9-1-1 star continued. \u201cBut what carried me forward was community. What pushed me to keep going was hope. Those Black men and women who made room, those peers who told the truth, those audiences who showed up anyway and a persistent sacred belief that our stories are not trends. They are truths.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tAfter pausing for applause from the audience, Bassett added, \u201cTargets are being put on our backs as people by those at the highest heights of power in the world. And the only way to combat such vitriol and racism and misinformation about who we are is to keep telling our own stories, by showing the power of our individual and collective journeys. And to not just show the world the kings and queens that we have always been, but to also show them that we do belong, we do matter, and we are not going anywhere because we are home.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWhen I look at this moment, challenging as it is, hope is still what sustains me,\u201d Bassett concluded. \u201cMy hope for the future is not simply that we are included. My hope is that we are empowered. I hope we move beyond \u2018firsts\u2019 and \u2018onlys,\u2019 beyond symbolism without infrastructure. I hope we invest not just in talent but in longevity, in ownership, in mentorship, in legacy. And I hope when the cultural winds shift, as they always do, we do not retreat from one another but that we pull together. To the young artists in this room and those watching who are wondering if there\u2019s still a place for you, hear me and hear me well: You belong here. Your voice matters. And this industry is better when you are shaping it. And to those with power, real power, I challenge you. Be brave. Choose courage over comfort to understand that the future of film and television will not be saved by playing it safe but by allowing us all to have a voice.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tBassett was one of five honorees celebrated by the American Black Film Festival<\/a> during the awards<\/a> ceremony. Dwayne Johnson<\/a> was presented with the Entertainment Icon Award, Jennifer Hudson<\/a> received the Renaissance Award, actress and director Salli Richardson-Whitfield<\/a> was honored with the Evolution Award, and F1: The Movie<\/a> star Damson Idris<\/a> received the Horizon Award. ABFF also delivered a special tribute to the creative team behind Sinners<\/a>, with the movie\u2019s Oscar-nominated stars Michael B. Jordan and Wunmi Mosaku presenting the honor to the film\u2019s producers Ryan Coogler<\/a>, Zinzi Coogler and Sev Ohanian.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWhen I first got to Hollywood, I looked around, and I didn\u2019t see anybody who looked like me; I didn\u2019t see a half-Black, half-Samoan man who I could look to or that was a blueprint,\u201d Johnson said, accepting his award, presented to him by friend and Wicked director Jon M. Chu. \u201cI was told back then \u2014 the big stars at that time [were] George Clooney, Johnny Depp and Will Smith \u2014 \u2018well, you shouldn\u2019t call yourself The Rock.\u2019 \u2018Maybe you shouldn\u2019t go to the gym as much.\u2019 \u2018You shouldn\u2019t talk about wrestling.\u2019 \u2018They do it like that, you should do it like this.\u2019 And I tried that for a little while, and I thought, \u2018This doesn\u2019t feel right to me.\u2019 I wanted to break that infrastructure, and I said, \u2018Well, I\u2019m going to do this. I\u2019ve got to do it my way.\u2019<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI feel like everybody in this room and in our industry, as artists, as creatives, as human beings, I believe we all have that chip. It\u2019s that desire to chase that greatness,\u201d The Smashing Machine star continued. \u201cWe also have this fire in our spine, I believe, to do more and to buck the odds. And when someone says, \u2018Hey, you should do it like this,\u2019 or \u2018You can\u2019t do it like that,\u2019 or \u2018Stay in your lane; it\u2019s working,\u2019 I don\u2019t want to stay in my lane. I want to do more. I want to take a brass ring and take it to places that it\u2019s never been taken before. And if I fail, that\u2019s okay because I failed being myself.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Angela Bassett openly shared her thoughts on AI, the regression of D.E.I. efforts and the entertainment industry at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":475078,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[220093,220094,119522,10546,236,138707,4224,88,220095,36086,41717,47237,21959],"class_list":{"0":"post-475077","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-celebrities","8":"tag-abff","9":"tag-american-black-film-festival","10":"tag-angela-bassett","11":"tag-awards","12":"tag-celebrities","13":"tag-damson-idris","14":"tag-dwayne-johnson","15":"tag-entertainment","16":"tag-f1-the-movie","17":"tag-jennifer-hudson","18":"tag-ryan-coogler","19":"tag-salli-richardson-whitfield","20":"tag-sinners"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/475077","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=475077"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/475077\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/475078"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=475077"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=475077"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=475077"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}